Envoy Wraps Up Talks In N. Korea

October 06, 2002|By Tribune Newspapers

SEOUL, SOUTH KOREA — A U.S. envoy dispatched by President Bush concluded three days of talks with officials in North Korea on Saturday but offered few clues about any improvement in relations between their nations.

Assistant Secretary of State James A. Kelly said his consultations with senior officials of the country Bush has labeled part of an "axis of evil" were candid and that he had conveyed Washington's "serious concern" about North Korea's missile and weapons programs, human rights record and "dire humanitarian situation."

Kelly's was the first visit to North Korea by a senior U.S. diplomat since former Secretary of State Madeleine Albright met with leader Kim Jong Il two years ago in Pyongyang, the capital, raising toasts at dinners and attending a "mass games" performance at his side.

Kelly's four meetings in Pyongyang included sessions with Kim Yong Nam, second in North Korea's hierarchy under Kim Jong Il and the North's ceremonial head of state, and with First Vice Foreign Minister Kang Sok Ju, who negotiated a U.S.-North Korean nuclear agreement eight years ago.

The United States keyed in on North Korea's weapons of mass destruction, missile development programs, missile exports and conventional force deployment, telling North Korean officials that the nation's conduct "could have implications for regional and global security," Kelly said.

"The meetings were frank, as befits the seriousness of our differences, and they were useful too," Kelly said in brief remarks to the media in Seoul. He refused to take questions or elaborate.